"Your mum keeps glaring at you," Manda whispered softly to the twins and Mundungus who were tucked away in the corner of the room whispering to each other.

Fred looked over his shoulder briefly and sent his mother a smile as George pulled Manda down to sit in his lap. Manda kissed his cheek gently and leaned her head on his shoulder, not really listening to the conversation that was going on around her. She traced small designs on the back of his hand, something that she did often. She usually did it with a pen that Hermione always made sure to make sure she had on her in case Manda had sudden inspiration. In fact, there was a whole bin full of dead pens and broken pencils in her room and George's hand was nearly always covered in ink, as was Blaise and Theo's whenever George wasn't around.

George watched her, occasionally blanking out the conversation before he was dragged back in to it by something either Fred or Mundungus had said. He noticed the way that Manda's eyes kept changing colours, probably to the colour of whatever it was she had decided would be a certain colour on the drawing if she actually had the colours with her. That was what he was assuming anyway. He always noticed the little things about her, the way that she sometimes had freckles and sometimes her eyes changed colour.

Manda kissed his cheek before she slipped out of his lap and went to go grab a drink. That was when she saw Noah trying to grab something off the table. He almost had it but she knew that if she didn't help him now, that whole table and all of the food and drink on it were going to come crashing on the floor.

"How about I help you there, buddy?" Manda said softly as she picked up her little brother and looking down at the table.

"Otay. Dat one," Noah said as he pointed to the plate of cupcakes, more specifically the only chocolate cupcake left on the plate.

Manda smiled softly and handed it to him, kissing his temple gently. "There you go. You seen Daddy anywhere, Little Man?" Manda asked him with a raised eyebrow.

But it was way too late. Noah was already completely invested in nothing but this one chocolate cupcake that was now in his hands. Manda chuckled softly and set the boy down in Bill's lap, who ended up grinning and talking to the toddler immediately after he was set in his lap. Manda decided to go looking for her father and when she didn't find him in the room or on the first floor at all, she made her way upstairs where she heard sobbing.

She frowned and made her way down to the study, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear as she carefully pushed the door open. Her frown worsened when she saw Molly sobbing... but then she saw why she was sobbing and a strangled sob left Manda's lips.

George... George wasn't dead. He couldn't be. She'd seen him downstairs mere minutes ago. Sure he was reckless but he couldn't be that reckless and stupid to get himself killed in the few minutes that she was gone to get himself killed out of nowhere.

But then Molly let out a choked Riddikulus and the bodies on the floor changed from Fred and George to Ron. Manda quickly yelled down the stairs for someone and the first two people that got to them were Remus and Sirius. Sirius pulled his daughter close while Remus dealt with the Boggart. Unlike everyone else, he faced his worst fear every single month.

Sirius carefully guided his shaking daughter out of the room and down the hall to her own. He noticed that her hair was a worrying shade of dark blue and that she had flinched a bit when he led her out of the room, almost like she was terrified to leave in case she found that horror in front of her somewhere else. He slowly guided her in to her room and helped her lay down, holding her still as he ran a hand through her hair gently. It had always worked as a baby to have her hair played with, so there wasn't much of a reason for it not to work now.

"Everything's okay. George is on his way up. He's okay," Sirius whispered softly as he saw her hair slightly turn a lighter shade of blue at hearing George was okay. "I am sorry, Manda. I would have come back sooner if I knew how you'd been treated. I thought you were with your mum still. I didn't know. I would have come back and we would have been a family. Everything would have been as it should have been. I mean, we would have been on the run mostly like we are now but still."

Manda's shaking started to subside as she listened to her father speak, knowing even before than that he'd never meant what he'd said when she'd asked him if he'd ever have broken out sooner for her. She cuddled up to her father a bit more, the shaking now at a complete stop but her hair still blue.

"I just didn't want to be the reason that your life went all over the place but apparently I already caused that. I didn't just break out because of Harry. I did it because of you as well. That's why I came to find you first and you looked happy so I let you be," Sirius explained before he got up so that George could take his spot.

George made his way over and laid down beside Manda, holding her close to him as Sirius started to leave the room. The door quietly closed behind him and Manda sniffled lightly. George looked down at her softly and kissed her forehead.

"It's okay. I've got you," he whispered softly.

And she knew that was true. No matter what happened, George was always there to hold her at the end of the day. She just hoped it would always be that way.